The Financial Architect for Hamilton's Trade Contractors.
I rebuild the financial operating system inside $2M–$20M trade contractors — so the data your field teams generate becomes the numbers you can run the business on.
Your foreman wouldn't frame a house without a blueprint. Stop running your finance function without one.
You don't have an IT problem.
You don't have an accounting problem.
You have a bridge problem. The data exists — it's trapped between two systems that don't speak to each other.
Can install the software
They'll set up ServiceTitan on your iPads and connect it to your network. They can't tell you how to structure your Pricebook to hit a 45% gross margin. They're technologists, not financial architects.
Builds the bridge
I configure the operational software to produce financially accurate data — then read that data as your CFO. One person. Both sides of the bridge. No translation layer. No finger-pointing.
Can file your taxes
They reconcile what happened last month. They don't log into Jobber to fix why your job costing is wrong. They expect clean data upstream. They're compliance officers, not process engineers.
Does any of this sound familiar?
These aren't technology problems. They're financial-operations problems — and they have a fix.
Five-figure software, zero insight
You're paying $15K–$30K a year for ServiceTitan or Procore and using it as a glorified dispatch calendar. The Pricebook isn't configured. The GL isn't mapped. The data doesn't flow.
Job-cost reports that arrive too late
By the time your accountant sends the monthly P&L, the job is already done. You're managing backwards — reacting to history instead of steering the business in real time.
No idea which crew is profitable
Your HVAC crew and your plumbing crew both look busy. One is funding the other. Without job-level costing, you're averaging out the winners and the losers — and calling it a margin.
You're in the right market at the right time.
Hamilton is in the middle of a construction super-cycle. Over $2 billion in annual permit value. A multi-billion-dollar municipal infrastructure deficit guaranteeing a decade of contract work for civil and mechanical trades.
At the same time, a majority of Hamilton contractors cite labour costs as their top operational challenge. They can't hire their way out of back-office chaos — they have to engineer it out.
The contractors who build automated financial systems now will outbid, outmanage, and outlast the ones still running on spreadsheets and gut feel in 2027.
Sources: City of Hamilton building permits 2025; HHCA market reports; Statistics Canada construction census.
Three ways to engage
Start anywhere. Most clients begin with the Diagnostic Audit and move into a Sprint within 30 days.
The Diagnostic Audit
Find what's brokenA structured review of your current software setup — ServiceTitan, Procore, or Jobber — mapped against your accounting system. You leave with a prioritized list of every broken workflow, every missed automation, and what each one is costing you in delayed payments and inaccurate margins.
The Implementation Sprint
Fix the pipesA fixed-scope, fixed-fee project to configure your software and automate your data flows. Pricebook architecture. GL mapping. WIP reporting. QuickBooks or Sage sync. At the end, your field data flows directly into your financial statements — without manual entry.
The CFO Retainer
Read the meterOnce your data is clean and automated, I act as your strategic financial partner. Monthly profitability reviews, cash-flow forecasting, and bank financing support. Because I built the system, this takes 2–4 hours per month — without the overhead of a full-time CFO.
From chaos to clean in 90 days
A structured engagement designed to deliver measurable results — not ongoing dependency.
The Audit
We map your current software against your financial workflows. You see exactly what's broken, what it's costing, and what a fix looks like.
$750 · 2 weeksThe Sprint
I configure your system — Pricebook, GL mapping, WIP automation, QuickBooks sync. At the end, field data flows into your books automatically.
$3K–$8K · 4–6 weeksThe Retainer
With clean, automated data, I review your financials monthly and act as your CFO. 2–4 hours/month. Strategic insight without the executive salary.
$1.5K–$4K/moHow the Audit actually works
No mystery. No proprietary framework dressed up in jargon. Here's exactly what the two weeks contain.
Discovery + Access
30-min kickoff call. You give me read-only access to your operational software (ServiceTitan / Procore / Jobber) and your GL (QuickBooks / Sage). I review three months of jobs, invoices, and reconciliations.
Workflow Mapping
I trace every dollar of revenue from the field — work order through invoice, AR, deposit, GL posting. I document every break, every manual touch, every place data leaks. No assumptions; only what your system actually does.
Quantified Findings
Each issue gets ranked: severity, time-to-fix, dollar impact. You get a one-page executive summary plus a detailed findings document with specific recommendations and a sequenced fix plan.
Walk-Through + Decision
60-min session where I present findings and answer questions. You decide what (if anything) you want to fix. No pitch. If a Sprint makes sense, I scope it. If not, you have a written roadmap you can hand to anyone.
Kevin Cosgrove
Senior Finance Executive · Hamilton, ONMy career has been built at the intersection of financial operations and process automation — leading finance teams in complex, regulated industries where every dollar of revenue moves through a chain of operational software before it ever hits the GL.
Construction has the same structural problem with different terminology. Your "progress draw" is a complex receivable. Your General Contractor is a high-friction payer. The pain — manual entry, disconnected systems, delayed cash, opaque margins — is the same problem I've been engineering out of operations for years. I'm now applying that expertise to Hamilton's trades sector, where the need is acute and the gap in the market is wide open.
I don't take on clients who need a bookkeeper. I take on owners who are serious about building a financially engineered business — one where the data works as hard as the crew does.
Platform Expertise
Your construction clients' books are a mess. I fix the upstream cause.
If you handle compliance for trade contractors in Hamilton, you've seen the pattern: month-end takes three times as long as it should because the client's field software and accounting system don't agree. That's not a year-end problem. It's an operational software problem.
I'm not a tax preparer and I don't want to be. I rebuild the operating layer — the Pricebook, the GL mapping, the data flow — so the books that hit your desk are clean by the time you see them. Your client gets better data; you get cleaner files; nobody's stepping on anyone's work.
If you have a construction client driving you crazy, I'd welcome a 20-minute conversation.
Email KevinStart with a $750 Diagnostic Audit.
No retainer. No commitment. A flat-fee assessment that tells you what's broken, what it's costing you, and what to do about it.
Prefer email? kevin@steelcitycfo.com · Calendly booking link coming soon